CEAS EuroGNC 2026
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Analytical Algorithms for GNSS-Independent Position and Heading Determination Using Stellar Sensors
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| Guillermo Pacheco-Ramos |
Assistant Professor, Universidad de Sevilla, Escuela Técnica Superior de Ingeniería, Seville, Spain. | | Francisco Gavilan |
Associate Professor, Universidad de Sevilla, Escuela Técnica Superior de Ingeniería, Seville, Spain. | | Rafael Vazquez |
Professor, Universidad de Sevilla, Escuela Técnica Superior de Ingeniería, Seville, Spain. | | Diego Zarco Vaz |
GNC Engineer, SOLAR MEMS Technologies, La Rinconada, Spain. | | Manuel Rodríguez Halcón |
Chief Technical Officer, SOLAR MEMS Technologies, La Rinconada, Spain. |
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| Abstract:
The increasing reliance on Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) has highlighted critical vulnerabilities to jamming and spoofing, driving demand for assured Position, Navigation and Timing (A-PNT) capabilities in GNSS-denied environments. This paper presents analytical algorithms for autonomous navigation using stellar sensors to provide GNSS-independent positioning and heading determination. Two complementary approaches are developed: sun sensor-based position determination through analytical solution of geometric equations relating measured solar vectors to ephemeris data, and star tracker-based simultaneous position and heading estimation exploiting quaternion attitude measurements. For the latter, a novel reference frame modification incorporating yaw into the Earth-to-navigation transformation enables direct extraction of latitude, longitude, and heading from quaternion data through Euler angle decomposition. Error propagation analysis via Jacobian linearization quantifies the influence of sensor noise, attitude errors, and geophysical effects. Monte Carlo simulations with realistic sensor characteristics validate the analytical error models. Results demonstrate positioning accuracies of several kilometers for sun sensors and sub-kilometer for star trackers, with the latter achieving arcsecond-level heading precision. Latitude-dependent performance characteristics and geometric sensitivity factors are analyzed, providing design guidelines for GNSS-independent navigation systems.
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| Keywords: stellar navigation; celestial navigation; GNSS-denied navigation; assured PNT; inertial navigation |
 View PDF CEAS-GNC-2026-023 doi: 10.82124/CEAS-GNC-2026-023 |
| Guillermo Pacheco-Ramos, Francisco Gavilan, Rafael Vazquez, Diego Zarco Vaz, Manuel Rodríguez Halcón: Analytical Algorithms for GNSS-Independent Position and Heading Determination Using Stellar Sensors. Proceedings of the 2026 CEAS EuroGNC conference. Madrid, Spain. May 2026. doi: 10.82124/CEAS-GNC-2026-023.
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| BibTeX entry (UTF-8):
@Incollection{CEAS-GNC-2026-023,
author = {Pacheco-Ramos, Guillermo and Gavilan, Francisco and Vazquez, Rafael and Zarco Vaz, Diego and Rodríguez Halcón, Manuel},
title = {Analytical Algorithms for GNSS-Independent Position and Heading Determination Using Stellar Sensors},
booktitle = {Proceedings of the 2026 {CEAS EuroGNC} conference},
address = {Madrid, Spain},
month = may,
year = {2026},
doi = {10.82124/CEAS-GNC-2026-023}
}
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